This is what happens to your body 1 hour after eating a Big Mac

You remember: the ‘special sauce’ titillating your taste buds; those mushy strips of iceberg lettuce feeling as if they’ve emerged from a gastronomic paper shredder as the leaves sweetly merge with cheese and two 1.6oz patties, while you chomp down on the three-layered bun. Before you know it, you’ve stumbled out the restaurant in a mixture of joy and regret.

But what really happens when you send one of Ronald’s finest masterpieces down the hatch, filling your synapses with dizzying joy and 540 calories? Well thanks to this great new graphic from Fastfoodmenuprice.com, we can see a step-by-step guide of what one of these burgers does to our innards – and it’s pretty damning.

After 10 minutes, it raises your sugars levels to abnormal levels, triggering your brain’s reward system by releasing feel-good chemicals like dopamine, similarly to how cocaine works no less.

After 20 minutes, the sodium and high fructose corn syrup start to take effect. After 30, the sodium will begin to bring about dehydration, tricking you into feeling hungry again (admit it, we all knew it deep down – they’re so moreish).

A rise in high blood pressure follows and by 40 minutes, when your insulin response brings your glucose levels crashing down, you’ll be even keener for another Big Mac. To find out what happens after 60 minutes, read the list below.

Cocaine-like qualities and loaded with enough sodium and sugar to put you in an early grave? We suggest limiting your habit to one a week from now on.

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Joe Ellison

Joe is a writer and editor. Specialising in film, food, sport, current affairs, travel writing and adept at pilfering David Brent quotes, Joe describes himself as ‘basically a chilled out entertainer’. Follow Joe on Twitter: @Chevychased